


Okay Now

by kienava



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Adora (She-Ra) Needs a Hug, Adora has a mental breakdown, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood and Injury, Catra (She-Ra) Redemption, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Fix-It, Hurt/Comfort, Mentions of Sexual Content, Post-Canon, Post-War, Reconciliation, Written Post Season 4, but damn I got some shit RIGHT, but it's in there, descriptions of bruises, nothing too graphic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-01-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:48:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22168909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kienava/pseuds/kienava
Summary: Everybody knew who She-Ra was. But after she disappears, after the war is over, where does that leave Adora? If she can't save people and fix problems, what good is she?(This fic written as revenge for all of those posts about how Adora's self-worth is tied to She-Ra and being useful and without those things she might spiral, thanks for making me fear season 5)
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Comments: 33
Kudos: 528





	Okay Now

Scars weren’t new for Adora.

When she was 4, she’d scraped her knee for the first time and it was the worst pain imaginable. Nothing had ever hurt so much, and nothing would ever hurt that much again. She’d been so, so sure of that. For several days--a significant fraction of her life, at the time--she refused to run or jump or wrestle with Catra. Once the brutal wound healed and she remembered how much fun playing could be, all that remained of the incident was a patch of pale skin splashed across her kneecap that faded away a few years later.

Again, when Adora was 10, she’d let Catra talk her into one of many stupid, stupid decisions. It was the first time they went all the way up to the roof. It was also the night Adora discovered her fear of heights. Getting up to the top was no problem (alright, it was some problem, because Catra was much better at scaling walls than Adora) but getting down was an entirely different story. They’d originally planned to sleep up there, but Adora couldn’t close her eyes without envisioning the nightmarish scenario of accidentally rolling over the edge. No, Adora didn’t like the way everything seemed so tiny from up there. No, she didn’t enjoy the weird feeling in her stomach warning her that one misstep would send her plummeting to her death. And no, she most certainly did not appreciate how funny Catra seemed to find all of this. Shouldn’t she be scared of falling, too? Why wasn’t she scared?

Adora ended up spending two hours shimmying down rusted pipes on her stomach just to feel the ground against her feet again, but an old nail had bitten her belly on the way down. It wasn’t anything to worry about, according to Octavia, but the thin, deformed line above Adora’s hipbone still made her wonder if she should have paid a little more attention while it was healing.

Then there were the marks on her back from the time Catra--

Anyway.

Scars were nothing special.

What Adora didn’t realize was that scars don’t always stay closed. The skin might look tough and feel less, but it’s still just that--skin. Thin and yielding and far too easy to break.

As She-Ra, she’d experienced a strange and unexplained respite from most battle wounds. Something about the magic in the sword made her own body impervious to damage as long as she never dropped her Princess form. But then She-Ra was gone, and despite the peaceful weeks following Horde Prime’s demise, Adora found herself with more and more marks littering her skin thanks to her newest hobby.

Boxing was fun. She’d never realized that punching could be considered such a refined and even artistic endeavor. There were patterns and combos to learn, movements to master. But none of that interested Adora as much as the feeling of her bare knuckles slamming into taut canvas over and over until one of them gave out. Adora would bandage her knuckles, or, less often, replace the bag, and continue punching until she couldn’t feel her hands. And then she’d keep going.

She was beyond familiar with the rhythm of combat, the sounds of hand-to-hand scuffles. But here, there was no armor clanking or weapons splintering or planets almost exploding. There was no space in the silence between her strikes for heroes or villains or power. She was the sword, the shield, the victor, and the fallen.

Of course people wondered where she disappeared to. There were parties and festivals and parades, mostly in her honor, but they all blurred together. People took advantage of any excuse to throw parties, and Adora wouldn’t deny them the joy they took in their celebrations. She simply didn’t feel any of it.

Sneaking away to work out alone was the only way to guarantee she wouldn’t be bombarded with incessant questions. Everyone from palace guards to stable hands wanted to hear stories about the Hero of Etheria and the no doubt splendorous post-war life she was living. All she could hope was that their interest would die out once the immediacy of the war’s end went out with the tide.

Save the planet a couple times and suddenly everyone wants to know how many squats you do in the morning.

The inquiries grated on her, but Adora didn’t want to risk being rude by not answering. She still wasn’t completely comfortable with Brightmoon’s social customs, and she never seemed to know in advance what might offend someone of great and inscrutable importance.

The more attention Adora got, the more she craved solitude. Beyond welcoming Glimmer home and working together to end the war once and for all, Adora had barely spoken to the Queen. Glimmer was busy, Adora convinced herself. She had a planet to rebuild. Weighed against all of the people whose lives had been torn apart by the war, Adora losing a sword that had never belonged to her in the first place was barely a feather.

Bow, of course, had done everything in his power to fix the sword, but even with the weapon repaired, She-Ra hadn’t returned. Once again, the sword felt too big and awkward in Adora’s hands, just like when she’d first picked it up in the Whispering Woods. She appreciated Bow’s continued efforts to lift her spirits, but post-training snacks could only do so much.

Pain flared in Adora’s knuckles as her hand collided with the bag for the thousandth time that day. It was a welcome sensation, strong enough to banish thoughts of things she didn’t wish to dwell on.

When had the feeling of skin scraping off become such a comfort?

Adora didn’t remember the exact moment she’d discovered how wonderfully distracting pain could be, but it was all she could bear to feel anymore. It was simple. It was comprehensible. Everything else was...not.

If she stopped hitting the bag, she’d still feel the last time her fist had connected with flesh, snapping Horde Prime’s shoulder out of its socket to keep him from crushing Glimmer’s windpipe.

If she slowed her pace even a little, she’d watch each beat of Angella’s wings against the ruined sky as she vanished into timelessness while the great hero of Etheria stood grounded and helpless below.

If Adora couldn’t fixate on the blood rushing just below the surface of her dangerously worn knuckles, she’d still feel the throbbing bruises on her neck, back, and stomach. She wished she could convince herself they were just more familiar dents from battle. After all, hadn’t they come from an enemy? _Former enemy_ , Adora corrected herself. _Former best friend. Former..._

Knuckles bloody, Adora finally let herself slip into the memory.

When they’d found Catra in a cell on Horde Prime’s ship, she’d failed to look Adora in the eye once. Granted, she was unconscious at the time, but even afterwards she’d avoided any confrontation or acknowledgement. It wasn’t right. Adora felt blood rush to her cheeks at the memory of how quickly she’d rushed to Catra’s side on the ship--through all of it, she’d never fathomed that she might lose Catra for good. After everything Catra had survived, was she really going to die alone in a dead enemy’s ship? Walking in to find her barely breathing on the floor was more than Adora could begin to process.

After days of feasts and dances and no Catra to be seen, Adora decided to confront her. She’d intended to yell and scream and vent her litany of frustrations over Catra’s reprehensible life choices, but she’d forgotten it all and nearly started crying as soon as she’d seen Catra curled up at the foot of an otherwise empty bed in a palace guest room. When Catra’s eyes opened, finally landing on Adora, something shattered.

Catra’s mumbled “Hey, Adora,” as she sat up only made Adora’s skin burn hotter. “Thanks,” she had the audacity to add. How was _gratitude_ supposed to fix any of this?

Adora landed a wrenching roundhouse kick on the bag. She let out a harsh laugh as she landed. Fix. She wished she could delete that word from her vocabulary forever. That was all she’d ever been good for: solving other people’s problems. What was she supposed to do without a mission? Catra, Glimmer, Bow, even Shadow Weaver--they’d all called her out on it. She was obsessed with putting puzzles back together, unknowingly forcing pieces where they didn’t belong just for that fleeting sense that she’d done something right. Without it, what did she have? If she didn’t hold things together, she’d fall apart.

With Catra, she did.

It was messy and perfect and too much and not quite enough, torturously slow and over all at once. Starved skin, self-righteous hands, blunt teeth and sharp nails--it hurt in more ways than Adora could count, and so few of them physical. She knew how to say the words, “I miss you, I miss you,” but they only ever came out in choked gasps and strangled cries.

Trudging back to her own room later, praying she didn’t run into anyone, Adora realized she’d finally discovered her own pain threshold: the only thing that could have hurt more than forcing herself to leave would have been staying.

She felt so stupid. What part of her had thought that _not talking_ would make anything better? Or worse, had she known all along that it would make things more complicated and done it anyway? She tried to justify it: if Catra had wanted to talk things through, she’d had plenty of opportunities by now. Adora couldn’t have a conversation all by herself. Still, this was the opposite of a solution. Now she was just more confused--

A loud _KRAK_ ripped her from her agonizing reverie. Adora looked down to see two of her knuckles turning a dark, sickening purple, and the fingers they attached to weren’t quite bending. At all. That probably wasn’t good.

She wrapped a bandage around her hand and considered ignoring the injury, but so much as thinking about moving her hand again sent shooting pain up her arm.

Adora could have kicked herself. Scrapes and scabs she could handle easily, but setting broken bones would require going to the infirmary. That meant Glimmer would undoubtedly find out, and she didn’t need another distraction. Bow would be far too attentive, dropping all of his other duties as Glimmer’s right hand man to nurse Adora back to health. If she asked a guard to help her, gossip would spread. Everyone knew that She-Ra couldn’t have gotten hurt like this, at least not permanently. This would only prove that Adora was just a girl stupid enough to break her own hand.

With another shooting pain, Adora realized that great hero had never been her in the first place. She-Ra was what they all revered, what they _needed_ , and Adora had tricked herself into thinking that being the vessel for that icon meant she was worth anything.

Without the power to fix things, she was empty.

“Adora?”

Voices. More mistakes that wouldn’t leave her alone.

“Fuck. Adora, are you bleeding?”

Alright. Usually the voices had less colorful vocabularies.

Adora turned to the door and saw a far too familiar silhouette walking towards her through the near darkness.

“You know they have lights here, right?” Catra said, glancing at Adora’s wrapped hand as a drop of blood hit the floor. “This whole place runs on sparkle magic.”

“It was daytime when I got here,” Adora argued weakly.

“And it was nighttime when I went to sleep. I’ve got some news for you about how the sun works.”

“Can you not--” Adora cut herself off with a sharp inhale. She’d made the mistake of trying to move one of her fingers.

“Alright, take it off.”

Adora looked at her, shocked. Was she seriously...? “What?”

“That gross, bloody wrap. Let me see.”

“Oh.” Adora obliged, hoping the fabric wouldn’t stick too much. The sting of the air against her raw knuckles was a welcome relief compared to the howling pain throughout the rest of her hand.

Catra barely looked at the gruesome injury before commenting. “You’re going to the infirmary, right?”

“No,” Adora admitted. “They’re overwhelmed helping the wounded soldiers still.”

“So you were just gonna stand here staring at a punching bag and hope your hand started glowing or something? Good luck with that, Princess.”

For the briefest moment, the painful reminder helped Adora forget about her hand. “I’m not a Princess anymore.”

“Disappointed?” A dead-eyed smile flashed on Catra’s face. She scanned Adora’s eyes, and Adora willed them not to betray anything.

Adora dropped her gaze to her eternally distracting hand. “I need to take care of this.” She shouldered past Catra.

“You can’t fix it.”

Adora froze. She couldn't fix it. She couldn't fix anything anymore--not even herself. What good was a broken hero with a broken sword? 

“You’re telling me you can set a break with one hand?"

When Adora turned around, all of the snark had disappeared from Catra’s voice. Any defensiveness was gone from her stance.

“I can help if you want.”

An hour or so later, the feeling in Adora’s hand had been reduced to a dull throb. Unfortunately, the lack of extreme, shooting pain left her open to be far more aware of the way Catra’s fingers ghosted over her wrist, sealing a bandage wrap in place, firmly enough to stay but not tight to the point of discomfort.

“You’re pretty good at this.” Adora tried to make it sound lighthearted, but she doubted her sense of humor had much steam left.

Catra shrugged, leaning back with her hands against the cool gym floor. “I guess. The Fright Zone didn’t exactly have the best medical care. I could set breaks by the time I was like, ten.”

Adora narrowed her eyes. “Why would a ten-year-old need--”

Catra’s hard stare was enough to make her drop the subject.

“Sorry.”

“Wasn’t your fault.” Catra paused. “I know I said it was--a lot--but it wasn’t.”

“It wasn’t yours, either.”

“Yeah.”

Adora’s good hand reached halfway across the space between them, but she pulled it back as soon as she realized what it was doing.

“So was that punching bag some secret spy for Horde Prime?” Catra asked.

“What?”

“You looked like you were trying to murder that thing.”

“How long were you watching?”

Catra hesitated as color rushed to her cheeks. She sat up straighter and dropped her hands in her lap. “I’ve come by a couple times when you’re down here.”

Adora raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really?”

“Look, I just--”

This time, Adora let her good hand land on Catra’s knee. “You can join me next time if you want.”

Catra scrunched up her nose.

“We can spar or something,” Adora added. “Like old times?”

Instead of playing along, Catra looked at the wall.

“Come on, I’m sure you have all sorts of rage to get out--”

“Adora, stop.”

Adora waited, unsure what she’d said wrong. Catra wasn’t the most sentimental, sure, but--

“Why are you acting like you’re fine?”

“What?” Adora sputtered. “I’m not acting.”

Catra cocked her head to one side. “You just smashed half the bones in your hand and stood there staring at it for like, a full minute.”

“So? It doesn’t even hurt that much.”

Catra’s eyes became slits. In the dark, they glowed preternaturally.

“Catra, I’m fine,” Adora pushed. “Have you seen how many parades they’ve thrown for me in the past week? I’m _great_.”

“You skipped all of them.”

Adora swallowed. She considered protesting, insisting that she’d simply double-booked herself for the events, but she knew it was a shoddy defense.

Catra leaned in closer, her knee bumping Adora’s just slightly. Her voice softened. “Are we gonna talk about what happened?”

Adora scoffed. “Talk? I don’t know what you’re talking about...talking about.”

“I think you do.”

All Adora could focus on was Catra’s mouth, so close and yet still just out of reach. “Can you jog my memory?”

She expected Catra to lean in and close the gap, but instead Catra jerked back.

“Wait, were you just--”

“I didn’t mean--”

“Seriously, Adora?”

“I’m so sorry, I--”

With an exasperated sigh, Catra circled a gentle hand behind Adora's neck and kissed her forehead. 

Adora’s mind cleared for the first time since the night they’d spent together a few days prior. It was uncanny, Catra’s ability to narrow Adora’s focus to her and her alone. There was a reason it had been her most effective strategic tool when they’d been on opposite sides, though Adora was starting to admit to herself that maybe that reason had always been what it was now.

Catra pulled away. “I was talking about what happened on the ship,” she said.

“Uh-huh,” Adora answered smartly. “What ship?”

Catra snorted.

“Sorry, I don’t know--”

“Will you cut it out with the ‘I’m sorry’ thing already? Are you apologizing for rescuing the universe from a creepy evil dictator? Or are you _so sorry_ for the time you saved the entire world from being turned into a planet-killing superweapon? Oh, maybe you’re talking about the time you screwed up _so bad_ by stopping _me_ from tearing apart time?”

Adora stared at her dumbly. Confrontation was certainly in Catra’s wheelhouse, but taking responsibility for her own mistakes? Had they accidentally grabbed the wrong person from Horde Prime’s ship?

Catra went on. “I don’t get it, Adora. Why the hell do you say you’re sorry all the time? Because you’ve literally done nothing wrong. Like, ever, I’m pretty sure.”

She was eerily quiet for a moment, and then her voice rose just above a whisper.

“Actually...I can think of one thing.”

“What?” Adora said, failing to hide the bite behind the word (she wasn’t proud of it).

“You saved me, Adora. You almost died on that stupid ship because you were too stubborn to leave me behind. You shouldn't have come back for me, and we both know it.”

She could see tears well up in Catra’s eyes, and it nearly drove Adora to start crying all over again. Adora reached her good hand towards Catra’s freckled cheek and Catra leaned into the touch, covering Adora’s hand with her own.

A moment later, Catra seemed to snap out of it, pulling away from Adora’s hand abruptly.

“This is so messed up,” Catra mumbled. “You don’t--I should go.” She stood up, but Adora followed.

“Catra, wait.”

“I don’t deserve any of this, Adora,” Catra added, wrapping her arms around herself as she turned to leave.

“Don’t deserve what? Me caring about you enough not to abandon you in space?” Adora said, taking another step and placing a hand on Catra’s shoulder. “I told you I’d never leave you again.”

Catra gritted her teeth, blinking back more tears.

Adora offered a hint of a smile.

“I want to deserve it,” Catra blurted out.

“That's something.” Adora nodded. Maybe they had brought back a different Catra after all.

Without warning, Catra pulled her into a hug.

Adora was stunned. Catra wasn’t typically shy about physical contact--she certainly hadn’t been the other night--but this felt like something new. This was Catra admitting how far she’d fallen and asking for a hand in getting back up. No tricks, no double-crosses.

Honestly, Adora didn’t understand how they’d gotten here. She hadn’t ever expected them to find each other again, not after the infinite ways they’d already lost each other. They’d been at war. They’d nearly killed each other, nearly lost their entire planet--

Adora started to cry. She tried to keep it to herself, but one particular sob escaped before she could calm it.

“Whoa,” Catra startled at the sound and released her hold.

Before Adora knew what she was doing, she was sinking back onto the ground, hugging her knees to her chest, and burying her face in her hands.

After a moment of dead quiet, Adora wondered if Catra had left.

Then she felt a warmth against her back and arms circling her waist.

“It’s okay, Adora. It’s okay,” Catra repeated quietly.

Adora blubbered through her tears, trying to express everything that she’d kept pent up, but under so much pressure coherent thoughts had long since melted into jumbled feelings beyond words.

Catra’s tail circled gently around her wrist, encouraging her injured hand to stop clutching at her own hair.

“Shh, it’s alright,” Catra said. Her embrace loosened just enough to give Adora's lungs room to shudder.

“C-Catra?” Adora started, her voice small.

“What’s up, Adora?” Catra asked, her voice steady and calm.

“If everything--” Adora choked on another cry. She couldn’t.

Silently, Catra tightened her grip on Adora’s waist and held her steady.

After a few hiccuping inhales, Adora managed shakily:

“If everything’s okay now, how come I’m not?”

How selfish could she be, focusing on herself when the whole world around her had just gone through so much? People had lost everything, everyone they cared about, and here she was, worrying about herself.

Heroes didn’t cry alone in the dark.

Then again, she wasn’t entirely alone, was she?

“Hey, Adora.” As Catra stroked Adora’s hair, her voice was softer than Adora had heard in years. Since before the war, before she’d left, before either of them could ever imagine things might end up like this.

Adora had thought she’d always have her best friend, and then one day she had the weight of the universe on her shoulders instead. She-Ra was gone, and along with her that weight, but still Adora felt heavy. Heavy, and empty--but why should that be such a terrifying thing?

Emptiness was created by loss, but that same space could be full of potential.

For the first time since finding the sword, Adora felt a spark. This time she wouldn’t become someone because the universe told her to. She would choose her own path.

And, if she wanted, she just might be able to do it with the person she’d always imagined she would.

By no means were they the same people they’d been when they were 17 and at each others’ throats, or 12 and kissing for the first time, or 6 and cuddling under a blanket and getting in trouble for laughing too loudly.

They had a chance to build something new, something that could never have grown before. Even if Adora wasn’t okay, and even if Catra wasn’t sure she was worth it, they were together, and Adora couldn’t help but smile at the possibilities.

***

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr: gideonthesixtyninth


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